Freight Futures

Freight futures based on DAT's trucking spot rates are coming to the North American freight markets. FreightWaves has partnered with Nodal and DAT to introduce the product that will be marketed under the TransRisk banner.

On February 5, 2018, TransRisk officially became TransRisk by FreightWaves. Same management. Same mission. Just a better name and broader focus.

The original FreightWaves.com was launched in March 2017 to provide market insights on the global freight markets. The news site was inspired by sites like the WSJ, Platts, The Economist, Bloomberg, and TechCrunch- except with a perspective on how events and issues impact the freight markets.

In less than a year, FreightWaves has become one of the most trafficked sites in freight, enjoying more than 400k reads per month. The news site also served as the vehicle to help launch the largest blockchain commercial alliance (BiTA) in the world. Read about our journey.

Our mission has always been consistent- to provide transparency and visibility into the freight markets. We are focused on achieving this through our news content, market data dashboard (SONAR), forum (BiTA), and soon our TransRisk freight futures offering.

Coming late 2018, the TransRisk freight futures contracts are planned for launch. FreightWaves has partnered with DAT and Nodal Exchange to create the first tradeable futures contracts based on North American trucking spot-rates.

The futures contracts will be financially settled, meaning that a physical truck is not involved in the transaction. All of the freight futures contracts are settled against DAT's spot-rate index. To understand more about freight futures, here is an article where we featured the concept:

FreightWaves was the winner of Steve Case’s Rise of the Rest pitch competition that recognizes startups that are out of traditional venture cities. The company plans to use the investment to promote growth and development of the people of Chattanooga.

The Baltic Exchange is changing one of their signature indices, the Baltic Dry Index, which averages shipping rates for raw materials like coal, ores, and grains. Baltic is hoping to make the BDI a more attractive benchmark for futures investors.

TransRisk, the developer of the first trucking futures contract, raises a venture capital round led by Bill Ford's mobility venture investment fund. Seven other venture investors participated in the capital raise.

One of the largest financial exchanges in the world has partnered with DAT and Chattanooga-based TransRisk to launch a futures contract based on trucking spot rates. The venture brings together the benchmark pricing index with one of the largest financial exchanges in the world.

Founded with the purpose of addressing volatility for brokers, carriers and shippers in major shipping lanes through risk-management solutions, TransRisk is one step closer to doing just that. The company, along with DAT Solutions and Nodal Exchange jointly announced an agreement to develop, market and list the first and only trucking freight futures and options on futures contracts.

Sandeep Kar, one of the commercial vehicles industry's most respected names has joined the TransRisk Board of Advisors. He brings decades of research and insights on the commercial vehicle market, along with a perspective on the impact of autonomous, electric, telematics, and blockchain technologies will have on the trucking industry.

TransRisk, a pioneer of solutions designed to allow transportation industry participants to efficiently manage price risk in the North American freight transportation market, has added nationally recognized transportation markets leader Donald Broughton to its team.

When capacity is tight, spot market rates increase, and that hurts brokers. There are other factors that affect rates, of course, but 3PLs have had few options to manage the underlying fundamentals that so negatively hurt their businesses. That is about to change.

With weather delays costing the trucking industry as much as $3.5 billion yearly, the impact is enormous, especially on shipping rates. TransFX is seeking to offer trucking futures contracts to help brokers, carriers and shippers better manager their exposure to volatile rates. As part of that effort, it has tapped into the expertise of Riskpulse, a leading supply chain risk analytics firm.

A futures market will react to the underlying fundamentals of its physical market because in the end, the futures price is linked to the physical market. But, the opposite is also true. A physical market can look to a futures market for transparency and guidance on rate structure. A developing trucking freight futures market might be the answer to solving these industry issues.

Since the dawn of the shipping industry, brokers, carriers and shippers have struggled with rate price swings, sometimes due to conditions outside their control, such as weather or politics. TransFX, a Chattanooga-based company located in Freight Alley, is trying to help change that by offering "freight futures contracts."

Amazingly, there's one area of the country where more than 80% of the nation's freight travels through on its way to its final destination. It's not Chicago, New York or Dallas. It's not even in the center of the U.S. Meet Freight Alley.

Those on both sides of the freight business have struggled for years with volatile shipping rates. Contracts get locked in for months or more with no assurance that the contract will reflect current prices when loads are delivered. TransVix believes part of the solution to this problem is the creation of a Trucking Futures Exchange.